GOSHEN — Goshen College announced Wednesday, June 18, former assistant coach Joel Gonzalez has been named interim head women's soccer coach.

Gonzalez spent last season on the Maple Leafs' sideline, assisting for Dale Stoltzfus, who recently resigned his post due to family health issues.

A high school Spanish teacher at Goshen High School, Gonzalez also spent five years on the Redskins' coaching staff.

"I am very excited for the opportunity to continue coaching this wonderful group of players," Gonzalez said. "It has been an honor to get to know them as an assistant coach and I am ready to continue to build upon what we were developing last season."

He continued, "I am an extremely competitive person and I want to push the team to be as competitive as we can be in practices, games and in all aspects of the sport to make us better. I hope to instill in them the desire to improve as students of the game as well as being a unit on and off the pitch."

Gonzalez, a 2007 Goshen College graduate, has also been involved previously as a coach with Goshen Middle School and the Middlebury Magic club program. In his one season of involvement with the Maple Leaf women's team, Goshen finished with a 9-9 mark, the best for the program since 1997. They also won multiple league contests for the first time since 2007.

"We are excited that Joel has agreed to step up into this role and are confident that his passion for the game, teacher's mentality, and knowledge of the players and system will be great assets," explained interim athletic director Josh Gleason. "The respect that players have for his approach to the game as well as their development as student-athletes was evident in their feedback and we look forward to the continued impact he will have both on and off the field."

The opening of training camp is less than two months away for the Maple Leafs, who officially open the 2014 season with a road trip to Purdue University Calumet on Aug. 27. Gonzalez will have 23 returning letter winners to work with, including eight who started five or more times last year.